Valentine Topiary/Kissing Ball

Valentine's Day has always been a fun holiday for me, maybe because my birthday is the day before. lol  In grade school, I always looked forward to making our Valentine holders at school, picking out the coolest Valentines to hand out, making sure I did NOT put the boys names on the "love" Valentines, then looking through every one of them to see who gave me what.  Then when I was older, as my friends and I would walk past the office at school, I'd secretly wish and hope some of those flowers or balloons were for me.  Well, that never happened, lol, but I do remember one year when I was in high school that I came in to the kitchen for breakfast and my dad had left a little teddy bear and a card for me by my plate (my sister got something, too.)  I still have that bear; it was a total surprise and really meant a lot to me.  While my husband and I don't do much to celebrate (we celebrate for my birthday and Bill thinks it's a dumb made up holiday created by card companies), we usually celebrate with the kids - a candlelight dinner, heart pizza, a little surprise in the morning, or a special dessert, just something simple but fun.

This year I decided I needed some new decorations.  When I first started on Pinterest, this super cute Rosette Kissing Ball from The Idea Room was one of the very first things I pinned.  487 pins later and I'm finally getting it done. :)  Yeah!

Supplies:

Roll(s) of crepe paper

styrofoam ball

hot glue

Tear strips of crepe paper about 24" long.  Fold them in half, or to about 3/4", then start rolling.  It took me an entire roll of crepe paper just for this one.  I rolled up the beginning just a little, and then started twisting and rolling, twist, and roll, just like you do for fabric flowers.  Then glue it onto the ball.  You could also just do a simple roll.  Play around and see what you like.  My only advice, you might want to do them all at once, I ended up doing it over several days.  When I first started, my roses look quite different from the ones I did at the end. 

These are the first couple of days - bigger, but more flat roses.

This is how I ended, smaller but stand up more.  These were my favorite, but I think it took more roses this way.

If you have holes, just roll a little scrap, fold it in half and stuff it in.

Now make a bajillion more.  Easy Peesy! lol  Seriously, this took me forever, maybe because I did it in little spurts here and there, and then a good couple hours yesterday.  So put on a good movie or two and have fun!  I'm hoping to get a white one and a red one done before Valentine's Day, too.  We'll see if that happens.

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